St. Paul Pioneer Press tech blog by Julio Ojeda-Zapata

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St. Paul Pioneer Press tech blog by Julio Ojeda-Zapata

Picking MSP wireless carrier? RootMetrics says: Verizon

If you’re between smartphones and wireless carriers, and wondering which of the latter you should choose, I’ll make it easy for you: Almost everyone, under most circumstances, should probably go Verizon Wireless instead of AT&T, Sprint or T-Mobile.

United Kingdom-based RootMetrics, which regularly tests wireless-carrier performance in urban areas across the United States, underscores this point with its latest Twin Cities findings.

Its report takes a bit of time to go through, but it boils down to this: Verizon aces every category — including data performance, call performance, text performance and combined performance.

AT&T also nailed the call and text categories (essentially scoring a tie with its Verizon rival). Sprint and T-Mobile aced none of the categories.

Data. The carriers aren’t on an even playing field where data performance is concerned. Sprint has yet to officially roll out high-speed Long Term Evolution wireless-data service here. T-Mobile officially launched LTE here yesterday; RootMetrics’ tests take into account unofficial T-Mobile LTE performance.

RootMetrics told me via e-mail:

The Minneapolis RootScore report was released prior to the T-Mobile Wi-Fi going live yesterday, so does not factor this piece in. However, we look forward to continue tracking developments in this market. In fact, we’ve already seen improvement for T-Mobile in other markets, as demonstrated from the D.C. report that was just released.

Once Sprint has rolled out LTE here, and T-Mobile is past its shakeout phase, RootMetrics could arrive at different findings here.

Outstate. RootMetrics’ data is for the Twin Cities. Outstate, the matter is even more skewed. Only Verizon has some semblance of statewide coverage, but AT&T is making strides with LTE coverage in a handful of cities, and along Interstate 35 between the Twin Cities and the vicinity of Duluth.

Sprint offers LTE only in St. Cloud (and its failure to deploy LTE in the Twin Cities is more and more annoying). T-Mobile has LTE service only in the Twin Cities.